South Fellowship Church

We're in the third Sunday of Advent.  I've got to tell you, I'm a big Christmas guy.   As you can tell, I've been a pastor for a long time and it seems like whenever we come to the Advent season, I thought I was preaching Advent sermons, but I was really preaching Christmas sermons four times.  Advent is a series of four weeks preparing ourselves for Christmas, yes, but it had a much broader perspective.  It was looking forward to the Coming.  Back in the day when they depended on agriculture, the harvest would have been taken in, but they would wonder if they'd taken in enough harvest to last them until Spring.  So there was a sense of uncertainty, a little bit of tension.  The early church instituted this season of Advent as a time for people to reflect as the days got shorter, and shorter, and shorter.  To reflect that there is a Coming of One who has light that would bring more and more and more.  There is hope that we have.  So, we come to this third week of Advent.  The days are going to get shorter.  I